“OK, thanks.” I decided not to mention the embarrassing episode I’d had earlier that morning. I’d been shooting some promo shots of a petulant ex-popstar—who was desperately trying to reclaim the remainder of her fifteen minutes by doing any reality TV show going—when I’d unmistakably heard either her, or her agent, mutter something about Gretchen under their breath. My head had shot up immediately; Gretchen wasn’t exactly a common name. They were gossiping about us? Could they possibly know she was now with my ex? Gretchen must have told them. What had she said?
I had felt myself begin to shake with adrenaline. Now I couldn’t even come to work to escape her? “If you’ve got something to say,” I said clearly, sounding far braver than I felt, “please feel free to just say it. Perhaps I can clear up whatever misinformation you might have heard.”
The agent shot the sulky star a warning look and said smoothly, “Sorry, Alice, all we were saying is how great it is for Gretchen that she’s been off the scene for a few months and yet rumor has it she’s up for a lead in a new Working Title project.” The surly girl huffed and then flounced off to the loo. “Sorry about her,” the agent said uncomfortably. “She’s just jealous. I know Gretchen’s your mate. No offense.”
“None taken,” I said faintly, bending over to fiddle with a light cable to hide my flaming face. I had to get a grip. Assuming clients were bitching about me, then having a go at them, was beyond unprofessional.
I plonked a tea in front of Tom and wondered what he’d really come to say.
“Thank you. So do you think you might break even this year?” Tom asked.
“With a bit of luck.” I tried a smile, but it fell rather flat.
“That’s excellent! Well done, you.” He took an appreciative sip of the tea and his glasses steamed up slightly.
We lapsed into silence and I said eventually, “So, I take it this isn’t just a social call?”
“No, it’s not. I’ve come over to chat with you about this housing situation.”
I sat down and said, “Has she sent you?”
He frowned and shook his head. “No, no. She knows I’m here, but what I want to talk to you about is my idea. So … clearly you can’t, and I imagine don’t want to, continue living in what is, after all, her home—whatever she said last night.” He said it not unkindly, but with no sugarcoating, but then I wouldn’t have expected anything less from him.
“I don’t—” I began, but he held up a hand and pushed his slipping glasses firmly on his nose with the other one. “Please, just let me finish. I know this whole situation has been unbearably difficult for all of us, at some stage or another. But I’m actually proud of all of us. I’m proud that you and I are still able to sit here talking, I’m proud that Gretchen didn’t make a fuss about you still being here when we got back, and I think it says a great deal about all of us and the people we are. It’s good and right that you support and help people you care about, even if sometimes it seems as if it’s at a personal cost to yourself. We’ve all pulled it out of the bag when it’s mattered, and that’s been a real achievement.”
He still didn’t get it. He still couldn’t see her for what she was.
“But I’m not proud that I asked you to move out of our flat in the first place, because of what happened with Bailey. It was your home as much as mine. But I was hurt and … well, anyway. That’s water under the bridge. Gretchen needs to be able to move back in here and I wondered how you would feel about moving back into the flat?” He smiled but shifted rather uncomfortably in his seat. “It seems a vacancy has come up.”
What? I stared at him. Had I just heard right? Live with him again? Was he mad?
“It’s totally within your price range,” he continued. “Two nice flatmates—well, Paolo is one of them, but you can’t have everything—and you could move in as soon as you want. What do you say?” He looked at me earnestly.
The person who had replaced me was moving out? I looked at him incredulously. He was actually serious!
“Yeah, because Gretchen’s going to love that,” I said sarcastically.
He looked puzzled. “I can’t see how it’s any of her business.”
I raised an eyebrow in disbelief.
“Look, I know this is not where we imagined in a million years we would ever be, but here we are and you need somewhere to live, urgently.” He sat back. “I should never have asked you to move out in the first place, Al—I feel really bad. If nothing else, just come back and use it as a temporary base, until you find an alternative. Whatever works for you.”
I opened my mouth to refuse, but then closed it again. I hadn’t got any better options … suppose I did just stay there until the New Year when … No! What was I thinking?
“I can’t,” I said firmly. “This is insane!”
“I’ll concede it’s unusual,” he agreed. “But it’s not insane. In fact, it’s what I want.” He hesitated and then said, “Without wanting to rake things up, I regret that in the past I wasn’t more spontaneous and less careful—always worrying about money and the sensible thing to do. If you see something you want, you have to make it happen. So …” He put his cup down firmly. “What do you say?”
Whoa … what the hell was that supposed to mean? Was he talking about us?
“Tom,” I said quickly, “I don’t think—”
He held up a hand. “Alice, there’s absolutely no expectation of any kind of commitment. No expectation of anything at all, in fact. I think you should just take things day by day and see how you feel once you’re back. If it’s too weird, you just move out again.”
“But Gretchen—”
“Stop worrying about Gretchen! Leave that to me.” Then he motioned to a stack of my boxes next to the front door. “It looks like you’re already packed anyway.”
“I’m absolutely desperate to get out of here, Tom,” I said quietly. “Like you wouldn’t believe, but—”
“Then move back in! You could be back in your old room by Sunday. I’d say Saturday, but we’re having a sort of welcome home/early Christmas thing on Saturday night. It was the only date Paolo could do before he flies home for Christmas. Gretchen’s coming.”
“Tom,” I said, “you’ve just asked me to move back in and you’re worried about a party?”
“Fair point, I guess.” He pulled a bit of a face. “Leave it with me, I’ll deal with it. Saturday it is then.” He raised his mug. “To fresh starts,” he said.
I looked at him doubtfully. “I haven’t actually said yes.”
“I don’t see,” he said, “that you’ve got anything to lose.”
When I arrived at the flat on Saturday afternoon with my stuff, Paolo was the only one in.
“Hola, Alice!” he said with a big smile. “Welcome home!” Which was nice of him. He even helped me carry my boxes up from the taxi, dumping them in my old office. It would be weird sleeping in there again. He looked at his watch and said, “I have to go and buy drinks for tonight—I promise Tom. Do you want me to get you some?” I shook my head and he gave me a thumbs-up before bounding downstairs shouting, “See you later!”
The room had the air of someone unfamiliar having been in it, but was spotlessly clean. There were also nine boxes piled up in the sitting room, all taped up, which I assumed belonged to the person moving out. Perhaps they were halfway through a run and were on their way back to get the last ones. I went to take a sneaky peek, to see what Tom had done with our old bedroom, but oddly found it locked. Maybe that was sensible given someone was moving stuff out of the flat.
I walked out into the hallway, heard a key in the door, footsteps on the stairs and then came face to face with a smiling but totally unfamiliar dark-haired girl dressed casually in jeans and a parka. She was holding a couple of Sainsbury’s bags. “Hi!” she said,dropping them, kicking her shoes off and wrestling her arms out of the sleeves of her coat. “You must be Alice. I’m Kitty.” She held out her hand and I shook it automatically. “The others not back yet?” She glanced at her watch. “Shit! I’m so late!”
She grabbed the shopping bags, walked straight into the kitchen, pulled the fridge door open and started shoving the contents of the bags in, wherever they would fit, in a very familiar way. I wondered if she was Paolo’s girlfriend? “It’s so friggin’ cold out there!” she said chattily, reaching for the kettle, filling it up and shoving it on. “Right! Best start getting ready! You all through in the bathroom?” she called over her shoulder as she marched out into the hall. Utterly confused, I followed her and said, “Er Kitty—sorry … are you …?”
She was standing in front of Tom’s door, fumbling with a set of keys. As she selected one and slid it into the lock, I heard the front door bang open and gasps of laughter followed by Gretchen’s voice. What the hell was she doing here? I thought he said he was going to deal with it.
“My fucking arms are going to fall off!” she cried.
“All right, potty mouth!” Tom laughed. “Just the stairs, that’s all! Biceps Bartholomew! Shit, we’re late! The car’ll be here to get the stuff in five. Come on!”
I turned to see them both staggering up, him carrying two boxes of beers he could hardly see over and her lugging several clinking carrier bags, puffing with the effort. They collapsed them down just as Kitty pushed Tom’s door open and revealed a totally different interior than the one I was expecting to see. There were bursting bin bags everywhere, spewing girls’ clothes out as if they’d popped like overripe pieces of fruit. The bed was in a different position and the lampshade was an altogether more feminine affair, as were the curtains. There was a poster of the Sex and the City girls on the wall and it reeked of vanilla air freshener. It was just the kind of room I might have had when I’d just started flat sharing.
It plainly wasn’t Tom’s room anymore.
“Oh, hi!” Tom said, genuine warmth in his voice as he saw me standing there. “You’re here! And you’ve met Kitty as well! Excellent!” He looked at his watch. “Where’s Paolo? This is his sodding party, too! OK, the car is arriving to get my boxes in about five—”
There was a honking downstairs.
“Make that the car is arriving now! OK, right. We’ll load all my stuff up, whizz back over, unload and then we’ll be back. No one is due before nine anyway. I feel bad that we’re doing this party here, I really do. We should have done it at yours, Gretch.”
“Hi, Al,” Gretchen nodded a hello in my direction. “We couldn’t because we didn’t know if Alice was going to want to move back, did we?” She shook her head in mock despair. “Can I send him back if he gets too much?” she teased, glancing at Kitty then flicking a tiny ball of tissue from her coat pocket at Tom.
Kitty laughed. “Nope. It’s been very brief but memorable—how I like all of my men.”
Tom held up his hands in embarrassed good humor. “OK, OK, ladies, I get the message. Are you all right, Alice?” he suddenly said. “You look like you’re about to throw up.”
“I’m fine.” I forced a smile. “Tired … from moving earlier. I might go and have a quick lie-down.”
“Good idea,” he said. “Got to be back in top form for the party later.”
He laughed a slightly too jolly laugh and looked at Gretchen, who immediately said, “Oh, absolutely. It’ll be good to have you there.”
I managed to hold it together and not start crying until I’d shut my bedroom door behind me.
* * *
Six hours later the flat was jammed with people I didn’t know, bottles of booze on every surface and the buzz of conversation straining over the very loud stereo.
I was drunk and attempting to focus on Paolo’s face, who was talking away animatedly, while I tried to wade through the waves of humiliation and misery that kept engulfing me every time I thought about Tom asking me to move back in.
How could I have been so fucking stupid? They were going to live together. He’d taken his stuff to hers already. Tom, Mr. Slow But Steady, had moved in with someone after barely three months of dating? How was this happening?
“So it’s not, you know, weird to be back?” Paolo ran his fingers through his hair. “Tom helped Kitty move out of your old office: he thought it might be too strange for you to sleep in yours and his old room. It is all change!” He laughed and then looked rather surprised as I knocked my drink back in one. “He seems happy with Gretchen, you think?”
We both glanced over at them. Tom had his hand on the small of Gretchen’s back, which made me clutch my glass a little tighter. Gretchen was excitedly telling a story to a small audience who were hanging off her every word. She was all in black, but showing quite a lot of cleavage and leg. I actually thought she only just looked the right side of slutty, but was prepared to admit I might be very biased. “I think he’s very happy with her, yes,” I answered, my voice cracked and brittle. Tom must have felt us staring, because he looked over and smiled, raising a glass in our direction.
“That is bad for me,” Paolo said reflectively and then looked a little shifty. “I find I still like her a bit, you know? Seeing her again after …” He trailed off, but I knew exactly what he was referring to. “Maybe it’s good for me that she is not going to be here anymore. I will lose my heart somewhere else.”
Oh for fuck’s sake. I stared at him in disbelief and found myself rather violently needing to be somewhere that a member of the Gretchen fan club wasn’t. I put my empty glass down unsteadily and shoved through the throng to get to my room. Opening the door, I found two people I didn’t know making out on my bed, like teenagers. They’d actually gone to the trouble of lifting my boxes off it. “Can you go somewhere else, please?” I said. “You’re in my room.”
The girl sighed, as if I was doing it just to annoy them, and I wanted to hit her for it. She sat up, adjusted her top and gave me a filthy look as she got up and stalked out. The bloke just muttered, “Sorry,” and pulled the door shut behind him. I sat down on the end of my bed and felt like I was falling apart from within. Drunken tears welled up and it was only because my door opened gently and I looked up, embarrassed to be caught crying, that they were prevented from spilling over.
Tom came in, clutching a beer can. He was wearing a fiercely fashionable top I didn’t recognize and jeans over sneakers. He looked good in them, just not very comfortable. I suspected Gretchen had chosen them.